When my brother was in middle school, he was in a wood shop class and decided he wanted to build me a hope chest. It’s a large (3’ long x 2.5’ wide x 2.5’ tall) box made entirely of cedar that is now over 40 years old and rests solidly on my bedroom floor next to my bed. It is crammed with mementos of early childhood toys long forgotten but held lifelong in comfort, baby blankets, soft terry cloth animal shapes with windup nursery songs, a few items of clothes that remain precious to me, and buried deep within its borders are the treasures of a pregnancy that ended in stillbirth.
Two sweet baby girls that lived and danced only from within, never making it to the outside world, and never getting the opportunity to witness the joys nor sorrows of the last 30 years. I have their tiny footprints on their birth certificates, the sonogram pictures of the stages of their growth and I have an album full of condolence letters from friends and family some of whom only heard of our story and felt compelled to share our grief.
The pain of those days and years to follow engulfed our family and I quite frankly never thought I’d know happiness without paralyzing fear, ever again. But God was faithful then as He is now, and our lives plodded forward one day at a time until joy returned in fits and starts and finally took up residence in our chaotic lives. Those dear rosy faces and the permanence left on our family will never die out completely for they are but part of the definition of who we became. Once broken, we picked up those sharp pieces and let them roll a lifetime in our hearts until the edges were somehow dulled like sea glass tossed in the ocean.
Such is the way I seem to view this year of 2020. It is a year of upheaval, of unimaginable turmoil and stress. A great deal of loss of life and livelihood. And yet I want to choose joy. I want to remember every moment because it too will define a part of our collective character. It should serve as a reminder that life is messy, never fair and ultimately a choice between succumbing to devastation and fear of what lies ahead and grabbing hold of the preciousness of life and daring to live boldly in spite of what seems out of control.
I went on to have 2 more children, both boys this time and they have asked over the years if the girls, Adrianna & Hannah had lived, would we have gone ahead with more pregnancies and had them? It’s a valid question and one I cannot answer. God saw fit to bless us with them all regardless and each has had their own immeasurable and indelible mark left upon us. And I am convinced I will see, and hold, those baby girls again.
One who has known the loss of a child can attest that you’ll never look at a life quite the same. Much the way a cancer survivor looks at the days still left and embraces each as a new opportunity to grasp and cherish all the more. 2020 came in like a freight train that jumped its tracks leaving an incredible swath of upheaval in its path. It took with it a bit of arrogance, an air of entitlement toward what remained and a sigh of relief that there may not be much left.
Marriage is the epitome of the example of a life well lived. At once so exuberant and worthy of dancing in the streets, a yearning of intimacy and connected hearts and yet challenging beyond description and often sorrowful. The back and forth of good and bad, of joy and of pain, of success and of failure and grief and of grace. It molds us. It creates within us an ability to be human toward another.
I hope not to wish that 2020 would end for that would mean that I hastened another day away in my life of only so many, only to realize I count less to come.
Capture this day, this month of December, this end to yet another year. Hold tight to it for it will not come ‘round again and I promise you, if you look for it, you’ll see the gifts that were wrapped so tightly within it.
Merry and bright,
Elaine
Romans 15:13 “May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in Him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirt”.
